CESAFI Basketball: UC vs UV today

Pacesetter the University of Cebu Webmasters hope to prove their toughness and durability at their homecourt today when they play against the four-time champion University of the Visayas Green Lancers in the Cebu Schools Athletic Foundation, Inc. (CESAFI) basketball event at the Cebu Coliseum.

For the 3-0 Webmasters, today's game against the Lancers will be the game of their life and this will be a true test of their characters whether they know how to handle tight situations and hardcourt pressures with the main concern of putting to dirt UV's unprecedented 47-game winning record.

The same also goes for the Junior Webmasters (3-0) who will be having a tough assignment against the Baby Lancers (1-1).

Over at the USJR gym last Thursday, host USJR Jaguars salvaged a 68-64 victory over the CIT Wildcats while the Wildkittens demolished the Baby Jaguars, 77-56.

In the distaff side, defending champion UC Lady Webmasters escaped with a 51-50 win over the Lady Jaguars in a controversial match which was immediately placed under protest by the losing team for an alleged non-call infraction that would have awarded the USJR cagebelles two charities.

It was a heart-breaking loss for the Wildcats who led most of the way but paid it dearly for not converting crucial charities.

The Wildcats hanged on to the lead until the last few minutes until the Jaguars grabbed the lead after a crucial triple by point guard Luther Justiniani, 57-56, down to the final four minutes of the ballgame.

The game was tied at 62-all just over a minute left but Justiniani gave the lead back to the Jaguars with a split charity while rookie forward Bobby Abraham Hatague scored a crucial follow-up for a 65-62 edge.

Armand Ponce and Herbert Arellano scored the insurance points for the Jaguars to give rookie coach Donaldo Duran his first win in three games while the Wildcats fell to a 0-3 win-loss record.

Wildcats coach Alex dela Torre, for his part, blew his top after the game, scolding the table officials for not charging to him their last timeout in the final 17 seconds.

Also, the Wildcats missed six important charities that would have given them the victory.

Ponce, a rookie guard, was sent to the charity line after Ronel Villarba was whistled for unsportsmanlike conduct but he missed the two charities.

Moments later, Jaguar Ryan Arpay was also charged for an unsportsmanlike foul against Wildcat Jessie Bustos but still no conversions were made.

And so goes for Jerry Lumongsod, who also missed charities.

Justiniani led the Jaguars with 20 points including three triples while Lumongsod who scored 11 points in the second period, led the Wildcats with 14 points.